Hizballah is bent on making Israel’s northern borders active warfronts. Early Wednesday, March 5, an Israeli patrol fired on a group planting a roadside bomb at the Syrian-Israeli border fence near Merom Hagolan, Five days ago, Hizballah launched two rockets against an IDF Golan outpost. Due warning of the coming escalation came from Bashar Assad's communications adviser Bouthaina Shaaban in an interview March 3 to Hizballah's mouthpiece, the al-Mayadeen news network. debkafile: This action would not have been approved without Tehran’s say-so.

Western sources report that Israeli Air Force strikes in Lebanon and Syria overnight Monday, Feb. 24 came on the heels of the first use in the three-year Syrian war of a Russian-made nuclear-capable Tochka (Point) surface missile - NATO-coded SS-21 Scarab - which carries a 480-kilo warhead with a range of 70 km. One or more missile were fired earlier Monday by Syrian-Hizballah forces in the battle for Yabroud. Lebanese sources report different IAF targets: a cluster of five Hizballah command posts in the Beqaa Valley, or arms convoys moving between Lebanon and Syria.

The Obama administration was forced Monday, Jan. 20 - the day Iran began implementing the interim nuclear accord - to put its foot down against Moscow and Tehran over UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon’s invitation for Iran to attend the Syria peace conference opening Wednesday. debkafile: Barack Obama and John Kerry were shocked to discover Moscow and Tehran exploiting the US outreach to them for independent steps on Syria in defiance of Washington’s conditions. They told Ban that the US would not demur for fear of upsetting the nuclear accord.

The US and Iran agree to treat Tehran’s regional policies as separate from nuclear diplomacy to forestall obstacles which such opponents as Saudi Arabia and Israel may raise. Monday, Jan. 14, senior US sources admitted: “The US and Iran have sought to insulate the nuclear negotiations from the tensions over Iran’s regional policies.” On the Syrian issue, governments near and far will attend Geneva 2, but Israel is not invited, although events in next-door Syria and Lebanon directly impinge on its security. Sharon would not have taken this snub lying down.

Iraqi Al Qaeda (ISIS), advancing Saturday, Jan. 4, on Baghdad from captured areas of Sunni Falluja and Ramadi, also claimed to have carried out the bombing attack Thursday, Jan. 2, on Hizballah’s political headquarters in Beirut. debkafile: Al Qaeda in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon are clearly in mid-momentum of a drive to seize footholds across a wide swathe of the Middle East, spanning three Arab capitals - Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut - in the role of Sunni knife slicing through the Shiite axis of Iran, Syria and the Lebanese Hizballah.

Behind the ballyhoo of the Geneva nuclear accord, Washington and Tehran have begun sharing out their areas of influence in post-war Syria in tacit concurrence. They have the same two goals: Blocking al Qaeda’s advance in Syria and keeping Bashar Assad in power. The details of this under-the-counter arrangement between Washington and Tehran are revealed in the latest issue of DEBKA Weekly out Friday, Dec. 6.

Abbas has gone behind US and Israeli backs to set up a mass transfer of Palestinian refugees from Syria to the Gaza Strip in fulfillment of his demand to accept the Palestinian refugees’ “rights” to return to their homes in pre-1948 Israel.

The three terrorists killed by Israeli forces in the south Hebron village Yata Tuesday, Nov. 26, belonged to the first al Qaeda cell to infiltrate the West Bank from Sinai, most likely through Jordan, debkafile reports. They came to establish a major new network for attacking Israel and the Palestinian Authority - hence the combined army, Shin Bet and special anti-terror force’s expeditious action to terminate the cell. It is feared they were the harbinger of more infiltrations by al Qaide forces embedded around Israel’s borders in Sinai, Gaza, Syria and Lebanon.

Turkish-Iranian intelligence cooperation has produced an operation against Syria rebel supplies through Turkey. Tehran wants to redirect Turkish exports from its Israeli route back to Syria, and use the Turkish route to promote Iranian products in Europe.